Apple chief exec Tim Cook has confirmed that the Apple Watch is on schedule and should launch in April.

The watch was announced in September and gave Cook the first opportunity to use the “one more thing” phrase. The watch is perhaps the first all-new Apple product conceived under Cook’s management and his expectations are high.

“I’m using it every day and love it and can’t live without it,” Cook said in the company’s latest quarterly call.

Even without the watch, Apple is doing just fine, with another record quarter. Bullish analysts expect Apple to sell as many as 10 million Apple Watch units this year, with sales of up to 2.8 million units in the first quarter of sales.

However, battery life remains a concern. Rumours suggest the Apple Watch probably won’t manage to pull ahead of Android Wear devices in the battery department, but if the analysts are right, it could overtake Android Wear in terms of shipments as soon as it launches.

Apple’s second-generation iMessiah Tim Cook is taking his chosen people into the desert of Arizona, and if the plan works, they will be there for more than 40 days and nights.

Apple wants to open a manufacturing plant in Arizona in partnership with mineral crystal specialist GT Advanced Technologie. The idea is to make sapphire materials for Apple's popular electronics devices. It will mean that Apple will create 700 manufacturing jobs in the first year and 1,300 construction and associated jobs.

Apple confirmed the plan, but would not say exactly what components would be made at the new facility or what products they would appear in.

GT specializes in "crystal growth equipment" for consumer electronics and other industries. There have been reports that device makers are looking at sapphire crystal for use in screens.

Shares of the troubled toymaker Apple rose on the news that chief executive Tim Cook had dinner with billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn.

While we don’t know what they ate, Icahn is believed to have "pushed hard" for Jobs’ Mob to buy back its shares while they are suitably cheap. He thinks Apple should buy back more than $150 billion worth its shares. This will boost the value of the shares without Apple having to do anything reckless like invent a new innovative product.

The pair agreed to talk about it in about two or three weeks. Apple has the ability to do a $150 billion buyback now by borrowing funds at 3 percent. If Apple does this now and earnings increase at only 10 percent, the stock it should trade at $700 a share.

In a curious post-launch interview with Business Week, Apple CEO Tim Cook, head designer Jonathan Ive and software chief Craig Federighi outlined their collective vision for Apple and the industry in general. They talked consumer electronics, smartphones and emerging technologies, but the most interesting remarks were unsurprisingly focused on the mobile space.

Cook argued that the mobile industry will not race to the bottom, it will split. One part will go cheap, while the other one will stay premium and focus on quality, at a price.

“We’re not in the junk business,” he said, in a clear allusion to the iPhone 5C controversy. Many analysts and consumers alike expected the new phone to be budget oriented, which it is clearly not.

“There’s a segment of the market that really wants a product that does a lot for them, and I want to compete like crazy for those customers,” he said.

In other words, Apple will stay decidedly upmarket and there is nothing wrong with that. Apple practically wrote the book on premium consumer devices.

Cook also took a swipe at Android, pointing out that fragmentation remains a huge issue. “I don’t think of Android as one thing,” he said.

Fragmentation is indeed a huge problem facing Android, but Cook’s remarks don’t really paint the full picture. Although Apple’s update process is much faster and new iOS versions take just days to propagate on most devices, Apple is also facing fragmentation, albeit a different flavour of fragmentation.

So, on paper, most iOS devices will be rocking iOS 7 in a matter of days, but in reality they won’t have the same feature set, not even close. What’s more, the problem is affecting relatively fresh devices. For example, AirDrop is not coming to the iPad 3, iPhone 4 or the iPhone 4S, let alone the iPad 2, yet it is coming to the iPad mini.

While iOS is rolling out, it doesn’t bring the exact same feature set to all devices. Many iPad 3 users are moaning about several things missing from the update, despite the fact that the iPad 3 is still a very powerful device and shouldn’t have trouble supporting said features. The same thing happened with Siri on the iPhone 4 and the list of “feature fragmentation” for iOS is very long indeed.

As the market matures and more users stick to their iPhones and iPads for more than a year or two, this nasty habit could irk more and more people. We're a tech site, we're not into philosophical arguments, but what exactly is the difference between version fragmentation and feature fragmentation for the end-user?

Apple Inc CEO Tim Cook is proposing tax changes to encourage firms to bring home more of their offshore funds. He is hoping that this spin will take pressure off what might be seen as a grilling from congress over Apples overseas cash holdings and tax bills.

Cook's cunning plan is to put more companies' offshore money to use creating jobs and conducting research and development in the United States. Basically this means the US would have to cut its 35 percent tax on cash brought back to the United States which he thinks is too high.

Next Tuesday's hearing is centered on possible changes to the tax code to ensure that more cash-rich companies bring their money back the United States. Big corporates are being quizzed about all the cash they hide off shore to avoid paying high tax bills. Google is in big trouble in the UK, where parliament is concerned that it is lying to the tax man about how it runs its sales teams from tax havens.

Apple’s tumbling stock price seems to be raising quite a few eyebrows on Wall Street and now it seems that the company might be looking for a new CEO to replace Tim Cook.

According to Forbes, Wall Street sources are convinced that the search is on, but there is still no concrete evidence. Late last week Apple shares briefly plummeted to just over $390, setting a new 52-week low. Small wonder then that the company might be looking for new leadership.

However, why replace Cook? Apple is in a quiet period and it will be a few months before we see anything new out of Cupertino, and that’s just a couple of refreshes. Smart TVs and smart watches might be coming later this year, or next year. Aside from Apple’s underperforming stock, is there any reason to oust Cook?

Granted, there were a couple of issues here and there, i.e. the Apple Maps debacle, but on the whole we don’t see too many sins associated with Cook. The iPhone 5 was not a revolutionary device, but it is still one of the best selling phones on the market. The iPad mini, which we still hate unlike its bigger sibling, featured an underwhelming spec, but it soon became a runaway success. Apple is apparently gearing up to introduce another cheaper product, in the form of an inexpensive iPhone for emerging markets.

Cook had some big and unrealistic expectations to live up to. He is no Steve Jobs, but he performed admirably. It is hardly his fault that Apple was overhyped for ages and that analysts issued insanely optimistic forecasts last year.

Jobs’ Mob attempted to hold one of its Nierenberg rallies yesterday, only this time the “faithful” were shareholders and they were far from enthusiastic. CEO Tim Cook thought to head off shareholder revolts and the fact that the company shareprice is tanking, by meeting with shareholders.

It was supposed to look like the shareholders were asking tough questions, but the ones Tim answered were clearly rigged by the company’s PR company. Take for example this exchange which sounds very pre-scripted:

Shareholder: "Are we getting to a point in the most important category where you've reached a natural limit?"Cook: "There's that word limit. We don't have that in Apple's vocabulary. When I zoom out and look at the smartphone market in particular, what I see is a market that is projected to double in the next few years. This is a huge market. On a longer-term basis, all phones will be smartphones and there's a lot more people in the world than 1.4 billion, and people love to upgrade their phones very regularly. "

Cook was impatient when discussing David Einhorn's lawsuit. He was also dismissive of Einhorn's media and legal blitz. Cook said the board is carefully considering Einhorn's proposal for the company to issue preferred stock and return more cash to investors, but he called a lawsuit brought by the star hedge fund manager against Apple a "silly sideshow." Cook added the company's board was in "very active discussions" on how to hand out more of its $137 billion hoard of cash and marketable securities.

Unlike Apple’s usual tame audience of fanboys, who give standing ovations for the CEO coughing, investors proved to be a tough crowd. Many said that they were disappointed that Cook did not provide a "more substantial" view on returning cash. Cook’s attempts to enthuse them by talking up the market, also went down like a bucket of cold sick. Apple's share price slid after the meeting. For example Cook disputed a view that the smartphone market in developed markets may be saturated.

"On a longer-term basis, all phones will be smartphones and there's a lot more people in the world than 1.4 billion, and people love to upgrade their phones very regularly," he said.

Shareholders were also not particularly impressed that Apple has moved to make the iPhone more affordable without introducing a specific cheaper phone, by cutting prices of older models. What is perhaps more telling is that Cook explained to them all when things got him down he just visits an Apple retail store. "It's like Prozac. It's a feeling like no other."

In other words even Cook is calling for everyone to believe in Apple’s reality distortion field. Just go to an Apple store and all will be well with the universe.

Before jumping to the most important announcement, Tim Cook started Apple's iPhone 5 launch event with some numbers, especially concerning its new Mountain Lion OS X.

Launched back in July, Mountain Lion is the ninth major release of what Tim Cook and PC Magazine call "the best OS on the planet." According to Tim Cook, Apple managed to sell a total of seven million upgrades making the Mountain Lion one of the fastest-selling version of the OS X.

There has been some word about the next Mountain Lion version and this one might improve the battery life, an issue that has been plaguing MacBook users for some time.

In any case, it looks like Apple is quite happy with the Mountain Lion OS.

Rumors of a high-level meeting between Tim Cook from Apple and Gabe Newell from Valve have been squashed. Newell claims that he did not actually meet with Cook last week as has been rumored.

In a podcast interview with Seven Day Cooldown, Newell squashes the rumor. He does suggest that he would like to meet with Cook and that he would have a lot to say if he gets the chance to meet with him one day.

In the chain of events that even saw the infidel scenario of Apple’s loyal customers turning against the company, Apple CEO Tim Cook traveled to China. He is expected to meet with government officials and discuss ongoing pressing matters such as iPad trademark and labor issues.

This is Cook’s first trip to China since he took over from Apple’s late messiah Steve Jobs. Apple’s spokesperson confirmed the trip but declined to provide details on Cook’s agenda other than saying that he will meet with government officials. Apple’s has found itself in hot water over its supply chain and labor conditions therein. Namely, it has been revealed that its shiny toys are made in factories that treat their workers as if they’re Windows users.

While the visit may suggest the almost humanitarian nature of Cook’s visit, the actual reason behind it is more likely to be Apple’s business in China. China is Apple’s second biggest market but it has been losing to Samsung as of late.

Apple already has iPhone deals with Unicom and China Telecom. The only remaining carrier, China Mobile, is expected to jump aboard as well, which is regarded by many as crucial to boosting iPhone sales in China.

Cook reiterated the company’s interest in expansion and said Apple has merely scratched the surface. He didn't say whether it was Aluminosilicate surface and whether it scratches easily.